


i want you much too much

by decayingIncentive



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Domestic, Fluff, M/M, Photography
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-13
Updated: 2016-05-13
Packaged: 2018-06-08 06:41:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6843340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/decayingIncentive/pseuds/decayingIncentive
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He started off with random pictures: A squirrel from across the street, pretty rocks on the sides of walkways, Jace wet from falling into a lake, his sister’s smile. Things he cherished and things he wanted to keep close to his heart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i want you much too much

**Author's Note:**

> For a Tumblr prompt.  
> Title from 'Craving' by Starling.  
> Send me prompts on my [ tumblr ](http://sparklesthewarlock.tumblr.com/)

Some things about Alec Lightwood are common knowledge. He is Head of an Institute; he is a capable archer and a gifted leader. He likes following the rules.

Some things about Alec Lightwood are only known to few. He is gay, he has problems falling asleep and the one thing he fears more than a demonic sneak-attack is being glitter-bombed. (Childhood trauma, don’t ask.)

Alec Lightwood also loves taking pictures.

It started early, on his tenth birthday, when his sister gave him his first camera. It was a bad one, made of plastic, and a garish orange; but Isabelle had saved up months to buy it – Alec had no choice but to accept the gift. He started off with random pictures: A squirrel from across the street, pretty rocks on the sides of walkways, Jace wet from falling into a lake, his sister’s smile. Things he cherished and things he wanted to keep close to his heart.

As he grew, so grew his hobby. He got a better camera, another one, better lenses, and before anyone really noticed, his room had acquired a dark room for his analogue photography. Developing pictures by hand relaxes him – after long missions, he’ll take a shower and go spend an hour or two tinkering with chemicals, observing them take effect and change his pictures in myriads of ways. Everyone around him has learned to leave him alone when he does this. (One time Jace opened the door to the dark room while Alec was in the middle of developing pictures of a sunrise he’d woken up particularly early for. Jace swears up and down he still has mental scarring from what Alec did to him in retaliation. Nobody is particularly surprised.)

Alec loves taking pictures of nature, of animals, everything that can’t be touched by the issues he has with himself and by the tensions in his family. He captures smiles, happy moments with his sister, his parabatai, and later with their extended group of friends. There are snapshots of Clary drawing, of Simon goofing out with an action figure, multiple of Jace showing off during training. He builds his own family with his camera, and carefully selects only the good memories, the ones that glow in his chest whenever he thinks of them.

And then there’s Magnus Bane.

Magnus, with his natural radiance, has always drawn Alec’s lens like a magnet. The first time they met, the first time Alec properly saw him do magic, all he wanted to do was grab the warlock and make him do magic forever and ever so he could capture every single nuance of his being and hang it up on all his walls. And that hasn’t changed, only now Alec wants to add pictures of Magnus sleeping, smiling, doing the most mundane of activities, because Magnus is captivating in his own right.

It takes Alec a while until he starts bringing his camera around to Magnus’ place. He doesn’t like to admit it, but he’s still rather insecure about being open with his hobbies and his preferences, and a part of him fully expected Magnus to scoff at him that first time. Magnus, though, was sweet, and continues to be – when they’re out, he points out cute, photo-worthy details, and whenever Alec has his camera handy, he very conveniently seems to find his love for posing. Alec tells him he’s being dramatic, but really, he loves it. Anyone would, if they could sneak pictures of such a gorgeous man, sprawled over a bed, golden skin illuminated by warm morning light.

There’s just that one drawback of having Magnus for a boyfriend: the man is incredibly sneaky, and will use this to his advantage.

Alec really doesn’t mind pictures of himself, as long as he knows they’re being taken, and as long as he has control over the situation. Things like passport photos he can sit through just fine, but he always gets antsy whenever someone takes him off-guard. He knows that’s sort of hypocritical, when practically all he does is sneak pictures of his loved ones, but he can’t really help himself. He guesses it’s a side effect of his insecurities about… a lot of things. (Not that he ever tells anyone this.) (Magnus still seems able to guess, though.)

But, again, Magnus is sneaky as all hell, so Alec doesn’t even notice when Magnus starts quietly taking pictures of him. He only notices, finally, when Magnus leaves his phone lying around when he’s out, and even then only because he wants to see what kind of phone case he uses. (He would never snoop when it comes to Magnus - his boyfriend trusts him and he’ll be damned before he violates his privacy like that. He’s been thinking of getting him a custom phone case for his birthday, though, and he wants to look at the make of the phone so he gets the dimensions correct.)

Alec turns the phone in his hands, contemplates the weight of it, and without thinking, taps to activate it. He’s just curious about what the lock screen is, no big deal.

Well, it wouldn’t be a big deal, if his own face didn’t look up at him.

He hears someone unlocking the front door, but doesn’t bother checking who it is – only he and Magnus have a key to the apartment. Instead, he tries to remember when the picture Magnus set as his lock screen could have been taken. His face is halfway turned away from the camera, he’s looking down and there’s a stupid almost-smile on his face. He looks awful. He has no idea why Magnus would want to look at that every time he accesses his phone.

“Hey,” comes a voice from the hallway, and Alec turns to see Magnus. He’s holding a plastic bag filled with food, his coat folded over his arm and his keys still jingling in his other hand. He looks out of this world, as he always does. Alec puts the phone back down and meets Magnus halfway. His hands immediately come up to frame his face as he leans down.

They kiss for a little while. It’s unhurried and sweet, less about kissing itself and more about being close to each other. As much as they both love to go at it, this might be Alec’s favourite sort of intimacy, just behind casual touching while they’re both doing mundane activities, small reassurances that they’re there for each other.

Finally, Magnus breaks away, and Alec straightens back up, can’t help but smile. Magnus smiles back; the warmth of it is something Alec will never become accustomed to.

“Help me put these away, will you?” Magnus nods down at his bag of groceries. Alec hums in response as he follows him into the kitchen. They end up making out against the fridge until Alec has to break it off with the complaint of his back getting too chilly.

After a while, they migrate back into the living room. Some sort of TV show is running on low volume in the background, Magnus’ fingers are ghosting over Alec’s arm, and he could not feel any more comfortable.

“Was there anything wrong with my phone?”

Alec could be a _lot_ more comfortable.

“No. I was just curious about your phone case,” he says, and tries to shrug it off. Magnus is quiet for a while, but then resumes the motions of his fingers. He knows that Alec wouldn’t lie to him, and Alec knows Magnus wouldn’t lie to him. It’s an equilibrium they’d needed a while to establish.

“I noticed, though,” says Alec, “that you have a picture of me as your lock screen?”

Magnus stills once again.

“Is that bad?” Alec twists around so he can look at Magnus. His boyfriend looks contrite, somewhat apprehensive even, so Alec surprises even himself with the vehemence of his headshake.

“No, no, it’s fine, really.” And it is, because as sceptical as Alec still is about pictures of him, he knows Magnus does it out of the same reasons Alec takes pictures of his loved ones – because he loves him, and he wants to carry him with him. He wants to be able to look at a specific snapshot and remember the day it was taken, the weather, the sounds of the world around them. It’s a window back in time, and they can observe themselves suspended, and the moment they captured never has to end.

It’s fine if Magnus wants this as well. The thought of it makes Alec happy.

“I just… I don’t know, I look weird in the picture you set as your lock screen. You could have used one I’m decent in.” Alec shrugs.

There’s a bit of a quiet after that, and Alec looks back up to a disbelieving stare.

“You’re not serious.”

“What?”

“That was your problem?”

Magnus shifts to reach for his phone and Alec automatically accommodates him. When his boyfriend settles back in, he gently leads Alec’s head to his chest. He follows, throws an arm around Magnus’ middle as the latter unlocks his phone and pulls up his pictures.

His folder is full of the most random pictures – Magnus’ breakfast, a funny-looking cloud, a lot of Chairman Meow. It looks like the things Alec would have taken pictures of when he was still young, and he can’t help but smile at that.

Magnus scrolls further up, and slowly but surely, Alec starts seeing his own face between funny-shaped blades of grass and unintentionally hilarious storefronts. It’s always pictures of Alec distracted, laughing, mid-sneeze, mid-snort even, and Alec has never seen less flattering pictures of anyone at any time. He loves Magnus, but he might just have to declare him legally blind.

“Look,” Magnus says quietly, “I have a lot of these. They’re cute, I like to look at them when I’ve had a bad day.” Alec guesses he can appreciate that, he is flattered even, but still…

“Why do you find these pictures cute? I hate them.” Magnus looks vaguely hurt, and Alec huffs. “Not because of you, because of me. I look so ridiculous, I have no idea how you don’t laugh at them. Is that a picture of me picking my nose?”

Magnus just grins and taps on the picture. Yes, Alec realizes, it is indeed a picture of him picking his nose. He feels offended, frankly, that these are the memories Magnus decides to keep.

As if he could read his mind, Magnus sets down his phone and prods at Alec until he has no choice but to fully turn around. Slipping onto his boyfriend’s lap and hooking his arms around his neck is as familiar to Alec as breathing now, so he doesn’t even really register himself doing it. He does notice Magnus settling his hands on Alec’s sides though. The warmth of his palms bleeds through thin cotton, and he shivers.

“Alec.” Magnus sounds serious. He looks serious.

“Alec, I’m not going to say that you always look perfect, because none of us do. Sometimes I look dumb, and sometimes you do, and sometimes we’re both soaked and shivering because the Chairman ran off during a thunderstorm.” Alec remembers that – they ended up finding the poor thing, but it took them an hour. A few days later, the both of them came down with nasty colds.

“The thing is, I don’t love you because you’re perfect, I love you for all the things that make you different. And sometimes I just need to look at how you scrunch up your nose when you’re in thought, because sometimes I forget you’re just a person like everyone else. And then I love you even more, because you’re flawed, and I’m flawed, and we chose each other.”

Alec smiles and kisses Magnus. It’s all he can do.

“I love you too, you giant sap,” he says later, when they’re out of breath and their hearts beat as one. Magnus smiles at him, pulls him back in, and instead of grabbing a camera, Alec lets himself enjoy the moment for what it is.

They’re both a little worn down and a little bent and a lot less perfect than they want to be, but they fit together in the best of ways, and Alec is blessed to be allowed to love this man.


End file.
